THE GREATEST OF THEIR

THE GREATEST OF THEIR GENERATION

The General Slocum steamship disaster in 1904, the tragedy that changed swimming history, had an impact on two of the greatest swimming heroes of all time, Johnny Weissmuller and Charles Robert Drew.

BY BRUCE WIGO

All historians relish finding coincidences of seemingly unconnected events that explain historical outcomes. One of these coincidences occurred when two of swimming’s greatest heroes were born on consecutive days in June of 1904.

JOHNNY WEISSMULLER

The first hero of this story is well known: Johann “Johnny” Peter Weissmuller. He was born on June 2, 1904, to German-speaking parents living in Romania. It was less than two weeks before the infamous General Slocum steamship disaster that claimed the lives of more than 1,000 people—mostly women and children—from a German-American church group in New York City’s East River. The Slocum disaster made international news, especially in Germanspeaking regions of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

When the Weissmullers immigrated to America in 1907, his parents made a point to teach him swimming at Fullerton Beach on Lake Michigan. At the age of 11, he joined the Northside YMCA, where he showed promise not only as a swimmer, but in running and high jumping.

But his future as an athlete appeared to end when his alcoholic father left the family. Forced to leave school after the eighth grade to support his little brother and mom, he went to work, delivering packages for a church supply company and hawking produce from a cart.

“You know, your guts get so mad when you try to fight poverty,” Weissmuller recalled. “I told myself, ‘I’m going to get out of this neighborhood, if only because he’s got a quarter and I haven’t.’”

But he still found time to swim, and it was while working as a bellhop and elevator operator at the Plaza Hotel in 1920 that Johnny’s reputation as a young swimmer earned him a tryout with

>Front page news from the New York World (June 15, 1904): General Slocum disaster [PHOTO PROVIDED BY INTERNATIONAL SWIMMING HALL OF FAME]

>Johnny Weissmuller as Tarzan [PHOTO PROVIDED BY INTERNATIONAL SWIMMING HALL OF FAME]

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Bill Bachrach, the legendary coach of the Illinois Athletic Club. Bachrach took Johnny under his wing and became a surrogate father and trainer...and the rest, as they say, is history.

Their collaboration carried Johnny to Olympic glory and international fame. Many of his records would last 20 years or more, and he reigned as swimming’s GOAT for 50 years...until he lost the crown to Mark Spitz in 1972.

Upon turning pro in 1928, he toured the country, promoting swimwear at clinics and inspiring children and adults alike to swim. Then in 1931, he landed the Hollywood role of a lifetime. He would appear as Tarzan in 12 films over a period of 17 years. No other actor in film history has had such longevity portraying a character, and today he is better remembered as an actor than as the great swimmer that he was.

CHARLES ROBERT DREW

Our second swimming hero was born on June 3, 1904, the day after Weissmuller was born. You probably never heard of Charles Robert Drew, but that’s why we write history.

Drew was born to African-American parents, living in Washington D.C., where he grew up in the largely middle-class and interracial neighborhood of Foggy Bottom. Like Weissmuller, the Slocum tragedy had a direct impact on Drew’s childhood, since the event triggered a nationwide interest in the importance of learning to swim and also resulted in a swimming pool-building craze.

It was in one of these pools, the segregated Howard Playground pool, where Charles Drew first learned to swim and show promise as a champion swimmer—before attending Paul Laurence Dunbar High School. Best known today for its legendary basketball teams, Dunbar was a “colored” school named after one of the first African Americans to gain international acclaim as a poet and novelist. When the school first opened in 1916, it was considered one of the nation’s finest secondary schools—white or black—and it has produced over the years an incredible list of distinguished alumni.

It was also one of the few public high schools at the time with its own indoor pool. Drew not only excelled in the classroom, but won letters in four sports (swimming, football, basketball and track). He was voted “best athlete,” “most popular student” and “the student who has done the most for the school,” and he earned a scholarship to attend Amherst College in Massachusetts.

Although he wasn’t a member of the swimming team at Amherst, he was a member of the Lifesaving Corps in addition to being an AllAmerica football player as well as a star and the captain of the track team. Upon graduating, Drew served as the director of athletics and instructor of biology and chemistry at Morgan College in Baltimore, Md. from 1926 to 1928. Then in 1928, he was accepted into the medical school of McGill University in Montreal, Canada.

But every summer during these years, he worked as a lifeguard and pool manager at the segregated Francis Pool in D.C. This was where he organized the first National Colored Swimming Championships that attracted teams from Detroit, Pittsburgh, New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore. In 1931, Drew gained recognition from the AAU for his meet. His Francis teams won the first five national championships before he graduated from McGill in 1933. * * *

Before continuing this story, here’s a little background about the International Swimming Hall of Fame. It was established in 1964 not just to honor competitive swimmers. It was meant to be the Smithsonian for all aspects of swimming culture—as a sport, therapeutic exercise, lifeskill, recreational pastime and its place in art and literature—from pre-history to the modern era.

Times in the pool, distances covered in open water, scores off the diving board and goals scored in water polo games are just one

way to measure greatness. Most certainly, the GOAT of competitive swimming today is Michael Phelps. But there is another measure of greatness, as defined by ISHOF’s Gold Medallion Award.

This award “is presented each year to a former competitive swimmer for his or her national or international significant achievements in the field of science, entertainment, art, business, education or government. There are no restrictions other than the recipient must be an outstanding adult whose life has served as an inspiration for youth.”

The ISHOF Gold Medallion recipients are a distinguished group that includes a President of the United States, a civil rights icon and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, senators, congressmen, a prince, captains of business and industry, war heroes, writers, celebrities and even a few who were great both in and out of the pool. Today, while thousands of young swimmers dream of becoming Olympians or professional swimmers, most are not blessed with super genes and a psychological devotion to following the black line that such status requires. But that doesn’t mean young swimmers shouldn’t “have the dream” and strive to be the best they can be—because in the process, they are learning invaluable life lessons that will serve them well in their careers after they have hung up their competitive suits.

And this brings us back to Charles Robert Drew. Unfortunately, ISHOF’s Gold Medallion, like the Nobel Prize, is not awarded posthumously—but if he hadn’t been killed in a tragic car accident in 1950, at the age of 46, Charles Robert Drew might have claimed both awards.

After completing his residency, Charles Drew was awarded a Rockefeller Foundation research fellowship at the New YorkPresbyterian/Columbia University Medical Center to study blood. He became the first African American to receive a doctor of science degree in medicine and the first black surgeon examiner of the American Board of Surgery.

He revolutionized medicine by creating a system that allowed the immediate and safe transfusion of blood plasma. His dissertation was on banked blood, and in the fall of 1940, he was chosen to direct “Blood for Britain,” a project that called for the preparation of large quantities of liquid plasma and its shipment to British soldiers on the battlefields of France.

With the success of the program, Drew gained international fame and was appointed director of the first American Red Cross Plasma Bank. During World War II, he recruited 100,000 blood donors for the U.S. Army and Navy. Their blood saved the lives of thousands of wounded soldiers. The following year, he established the American Red Cross’ first blood bank, a pilot program that became the model for blood banks all over the country during WWII.

In 1942, he returned to Washington, D.C and became the head of Howard University’s department of surgery and later chief surgeon at the University’s Freedman’s Hospital. Between 1941 and his untimely death in 1950, Dr. Drew taught more than half of the nation’s AfricanAmerican surgeons receiving certification papers from the American Board of Surgery.

Nationwide there are at least a dozen K-12 schools and six medical and higher education institutions that have been named in honor of Dr. Drew. In 1981, the U.S. Postal Service issued a 35-cent stamp in honor of Drew as part of the “Great American Series.” There is a Charles R. Drew Memorial Bridge in Washington, D.C., and one of the boroughs of Montreal, where he attended McGill University, has been named after him (Parc Charles-Drew, in Le Sud-Ouest). 

>Dr. Charles R. Drew at work at Howard University [PHOTO PROVIDED BY NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY]

www SWIMMING

On The Wall

FUELING FOR COMPETITION: THE “CHERRY ON TOP”!

BY DAWN WEATHERWAX, RD, CSSD, LD, ATC, CSCS

Athletes spend hours upon hours training. It is now time to put the sports nutrition piece all together when it matters most. A big part of the plan is to know what, when and how much to eat and drink before, during and after the event.

Step 1. Maximize your Daily Sports Nutrition Regimen

What an athlete consumes daily impacts training, recovery, immunity and performance the most. If an athlete optimizes all aspects of training, then they optimize success. (See SW January, “To Be an Olympian or World Champion, You Need to Train Like One,” and SW February, “To Be the Best, You Need to Eat the Best.”)

Step 2. Use Practices and Minor Competitions/Events to Formulate a Winning Plan

The goal is to use trainings and lower-level events to figure out what you will eat and drink throughout that day or days. Try items before trainings, sometimes within 30 minutes, pending on the goal. You would rather have a “subpar” workout than an awful performance. Athletes know they mastered it when they don’t have to think much about it!

Step 3. Eat Enough

Many athletes get nervous, have stomach distress, get caught up in the event or do not have a designed sports nutrition event plan—all which can lead to an insufficient intake of fuel at the right times to finish strong...especially in events that cover multiple days or cover extended periods of time. Even if the event is shorter in length, you need to be optimally prepared. I have worked with many athletes who have struggled with this, but found a way!

Step 4. Hydrate

Being properly hydrated starts a couple of days before the event. If an athlete is 1% dehydrated, then performance can decline up to 12%! It is important to spread the fluid throughout the day and make sure you intake enough sodium as well. The amounts needed vary because sweat and sodium losses differ per person. (See SW February, “To Be the Best, You Need to Eat the Best,” for suggested amounts.)

Step 5. Avoid New Items around Event Time

Avoid trying new food or beverages a day or two prior and during the big event. Athletes don’t want to take a chance that anything will not digest well.

Step 6. Come Prepared

Don’t leave anything up to chance. Take 100% responsibility. Pack things, know the surroundings and always have a backup plan. Many times athletes need to bring their own foods, stay at a place that has a kitchen or take a trip to the local grocery store to make it a success. Step 7. Know the Cuisine

If traveling to a place where the food is completely different than what you’re used to eating, then start experimenting at home with their local cuisine before going to the meet. An athlete can’t always pack 100% of what is needed in these situations. It is important to expose the stomach and taste buds to the unfamiliar. Leave nothing to chance!

Step 8. Eat Clean

This is pretty straightforward: Why train so hard before an event, then go to that event and eat fried foods, sweets and foods smothered with unhealthy fats that have little nutritional value? For those over 21 years old...that also means alcohol. NOTHING MORE TO SAY!

Step 9. Work with an Expert

If you are really serious about your sport, I highly recommend working with a sports dietitian. There is a lot of misinformation out there. Each athlete is different. When researching, look for the CSSD credential (board-certified specialist in sports dietetics). It takes seven to nine years of schooling and experience to obtain a CSSD credential. You can also go to https://findanrd.eatright.org/ for a statewide directory.

When embarking on setting yearly goals and priming for main competitions or events, do not forget to start implementing fuel strategy plans along the way. To get ready for the Tokyo 2021 Summer Olympics, enjoy the following 3,000 to 3,500-calorie sample swim meet competition menu...with a Japanese breakfast flare. (Remember: This is just an example, not an absolute.)

3,000 to 3,500-CALORIE SWIM MEET COMPETITION MENU

(with Japanese breakfast option)

Breakfast (6-8 a.m.)

1 large Kodiak waffle or 1-2 packets of Kodiak oatmeal 2 T Nut butter 1 T Flax grounded seeds 1 large Banana 1 small Pea yogurt or Siggi’s yogurt 16 oz Water/soy milk/organic milk/nut milk/oat milk

Japanese Option

1 Tamagoyaki (rolled egg omelet) 1-2 cups Kobachi (chopped-up vegetables) ½-2 cups Rice or rice porridge 1 cup Miso soup

Fish oil capsule Vitamin D3 Vitamin C Probotics

Swim Meet (8 a.m.-12:30 p.m.)

4-10 oz Water an hour and one NUUN tablet per 20 oz (amount varies pending on sweat and sodium loss) Dawn Weatherwax (RD, CSSD, LD, ATC, CSCS) is a registered/ licensed dietitian with a specialty in sports nutrition and founder of Sports Nutrition 2Go. She is also a board-certified specialist in sports dietetics, which is the premier professional sports nutrition credential in the United States. In addition, she is an athletic trainer with a certification in strength and conditioning from The National Strength and Conditioning Association.

8-10 a.m No Cow Bar and fruit leather or orange

10-11:30 a.m Lara Bar, RX Bar or Pro Bar and packet of RX nut butter or nuts Weatherwax brings a comprehensive and unique understanding of the athlete’s body—and its nutritional needs—to those interested in achieving specific performance goals and optimal health. She is also the author of “The Official Snack Guide for Beleaguered Sports Parents,” “The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Sports Nutrition” and “The Sports Nutrition Guide for Young Athletes.”

Lunch (11 a.m.-1:30 p.m.)

1 Bun 4 oz Grilled chicken 1 cup Side salad 1 T Dressing 1 large Baked potato 1 T Butter/salt/pepper 8 oz Juice or fruit of choice 16 oz Water OR 6-inch hoagie, turkey/chicken/ham, any veggies, oil and vinegar, fruit smoothie

Swim Meet (3-7:30 p.m.)

4-10 oz Water an hour and one NUUN tablet per 20 oz (amount varies pending on sweat and sodium loss) 2-4 p.m No Cow Bar and fruit strip or orange 4-6 p.m. Lara Bar, RX Bar or Pro Bar and packet of RX nut butter or nuts

Evening Meal (6-8:30 p.m.)

4-6 oz Grilled chicken/no steak 1-2 cups Wild rice/pasta/potato/quinoa 1-2 cups Salad/veggies/stir fry 1-2 T Oil-based dressing/pumpkin seeds 16 oz Water

Multivitamin and mineral tablet Fish oil capsule

Evening Snack—OPTIONAL (8-10 p.m.)

1 large bag Microwave non-GMO natural popcorn 1 Evolve or Orgain shake 4-8 oz Odwalla, Naked or Bolthouse smoothie

After meet is completely over, enjoy a meal or beverage that

might not be ideal! 

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